Spring has sprung and with it the hibernation of Beijing’s sports scene begins to end. We’ll tell you all about what you have to look forward to over the coming months. But first, the sports news of the week.

Balls, balls, balls. It's been quite a week of sport and it promises to be a sport-tacular weekend. Read on for more on what's on to watch, what's been going on and how you can get involved. Let's start with the 500-pound linebacker in the room. The Super Bowl takes place at 7.30am on Monday. Here's a list of where you can pack yourselves in and decide whether the best New is England or York.

The preliminary fixture list for the upcoming season of the Chinese Super League has been announced. Beijing Guoan are scheduled to start with a home game against Guangzhou Fuli on the weekend of March 10/11 and then follow it up with an early season grudge match against Shanghai Shenhua on March 16. It doesn't really get any better than Friday nights watching Beijing take on Shanghai under the floodlights - and with their new signings including the likes of Nicolas Anelka and Guoan's Joel Griffiths there's added spice. Come on you greens.

Below are some big games to look out for and Wild East Football have started to list the the full season here. Bear in mind that this is preliminary and subject to change. One factor that will certainly affect it is Beijing's AFC Champions' League progress (or not, based on previous campaigns).

Li Na and Zheng Jie are still in the Australian Open. You can spend your week off watching their progress in Melbourne. There are no Chinese men in the tournament. This will change, according to the ATP chief, Brad Drewett. He claims it’s a case of when and not if that China will produce a great male tennis star. That’s what exactly British tennis fans have thought for the last 50-plus years. Silly Brad.

It’s often that heads of sports’ governing bodies make these ill-informed pronouncements about China being on the verge of greatness in a sport that they’ve not yet shown any real aptitude for.

Happy New Year! That’s for the last one, not the upcoming one. Our gift to you includes links to the first two “Who’s Hot and Who’s Not In Chinese Sport” columns of the year from China Daily. It’s the same as ever, apart from the fact they no longer separate out the "Who's Hot" from the “Who’s Not.” How will we know which sports stars are worthy of our ire if we have to read all the way through?
Anyway, here are  the first and second. The latest features Top Gear racist Jeremy Clarkson offending another nation.

It's a post-Moneyball world that we live in, so we all know now that sport is nothing but numbers – a series of mathematical calculations, from trigonometry to probability. Anyway, now that sport's gotten all quant, and the jocks and the geeks are pals, let's have a look back at the important figures of the last year.

“It’s the most wonderful time of the year.” Well, it is for everyone who is not known as Festus Baise. The football player (who sounds like Festivus to the rest of us) has found worldwide infamy over the last week for the most unfortunate of actions – scoring an own goal. He did it in a Hong Kong first-division game and his Sun Hei side ended up on the wrong side of a 3-2 reverse at the hands of Citizen AA. Merry Christmas, everyone. Here’s your present.

Talking Balls has been locked in meetings for the last few days. This report has been phoned into the office. Apologies, Balls fans.        

Happy Black Friday. Take a break from online shopping (or for non-Americans, from finding out what Black Friday is) and give thanks for the week in Chinese sport.

On this big Thanksgiving weekend, let’s start with football – in what else but the American sense? The Beijing Guardians are going all the way to Shanghai to protect our fair city from a beating in the Founder’s Bowl. The game takes place on November 27. Let’s boo the Shanghai Nighthawks from afar and hope that Beijing win this debut showdown.

As these graphic images echo through the room of the Hilton’s press conference for their debut Black Tie Charity Brawl, the last thing one would expect from the fighters is civility. Meeting with the fighters to hear their thoughts before the big showdown, though, one finds herself pleasantly surprised in learning that the stereotype that MMA brawlers are aggressive hotheads always looking for a fight may just be an unfounded myth. Turns out, being a professional fighter requires a number of elements that would serve you well both in and out of the ring, such as an unwavering sense of composure, the discerning ability to leave it all in the ring, and the drive to give your absolute 100 percent to come out on top. (In this case, probably physically.) We spoke with 20-year-old Qi Bing Hao from Shandong.